Birthday in Full Bloom
by A-to-Q
Summary: March 28: Happy birthday ikemen-san. I hope you remain an ikemen frog forever with your fluffy white alpaca by your side.


**Everyone seems to only notice the pretty pink flowers, and not realise that it's the strong, beautiful wooden branches are tree trunk that is holding them up for everyone to see, and appreciate.**

* * *

Seto's birthday had always been during the time when the cheery blossoms were in full bloom, so the nice lady who took care of him, Kido and Kano would often take all three of them to the park to celebrate his birthday while gazing at the magnificent blossoms. Even after their caretaker... 'left', Kido and Kano made it a habit to bring Seto to the park to look at the cherry blossoms in full bloom. Sometimes, if they were lucky, they would be able to find a good spot to sit at while looking at the flowers.

A few years back, a little ball of adorable fluff joined their gang, but since she got tired so easily and was so scared of meeting people, they often had trouble trying to continue celebrating Seto's birthday that way.

Mary often apologised whenever they went there late and weren't able to get a good spot, but Seto didn't particularly mind because what was important was that 'they were all together'. However, Mary would always still feel guilty and felt that she had to make it up to Seto somehow, as he had helped her so much in the past, but she was only bringing him trouble and inconvenience so far. Thus, her New Year's resolution the very next year was to do something helpful for Seto.

She wanted to do something in return, to help the always smiling and kind Seto who saved her from being friends with only her books that repeated themselves everytime, without listening to Mary.

Not having anyone to talk to for more than a hundred years had taken its toll on her, and she found it awkward to talk to anyone. But Seto, being the first person in that more than a hundred years to talk to her, her wishes came out easily. So, she too hoped that Seto would just tell her what he wanted and not just the usual 'I just want you to be happy' or 'I just want everyone to stay good friends'. She wanted to know what would make **Seto** happy. Not something that would make everyone else happy. Not that she didn't want everyone to be happy of course.

On a particular 28 March on a particular year, Seto had to go for work, and didn't have time to celebrate his birthday at all. Kido suggested at least getting a cake for him, but Seto told her not to waste money by buying something so trivial.

Once Seto stepped out, Mary barricaded herself in the safety of her room again, and thought about what she should do.

For the whole morning, she thought and thought, with no realistic ideas coming into her head. She had thought about making a thousand paper cranes for him, but she had no idea how to fold them. She would ask Kano and Kido, but one thousand paper cranes seemed like an awful lot of paper.

She then look at whatever paper she had on her desk and thought.

"... Ah...!"

She might not have had enough to make a thousand successful paper cranes, but she most certainly could make a thousand pretty flowers with that paper. And thus, she got to work making the flowers. She wanted to make a birthday present that would be useful to Seto, and thus decided that putting all her effort into making the fake-flowers that he helped to sell would help him a lot, and make him happy. During the day, she worked non-stop at making the flowers, putting every single detail into the individual petal of the flowers before carefully joining them together to make a dainty, elegant flower.

When she heard the sound of the front door opening and Seto's voice, she ran out of her room with the bouquet in her hands, with a large smile on her face.

"Look, Seto! Look! I made this!"

Seto bent down and observed the flowers at a closer angle.

"Oh! They look really beautiful, Mary. Did you put a lot of effort into them?"

"Yes, I did! It's for you Seto!"

"For me? Why thank you, Mary. I'll put them in nice vase in my room."

"What?"

"Hmm? What's wrong, Mary?"

"Don't you want to tell them? I mean, usually when I give flowers to you, you help me to sell them."

"Oh...! You meant that 'for me'... It's okay, Mary. I'll do that for you. Thanks!"

Seto pet Mary on the head, and headed to his room, with the bouquet still in his hands.

"What was Seto thinking though...? He seemed kind of disappointed..."

In Seto's room, he saw on his bed and stared at the flowers in his hands. He knew they were fake, made by Mary, but they seemed to real. Seto had to admit that Mary was good at her handicrafts. Also, the flowers she made were all cherry blossoms. Each soft pink petal handmade filled with loving thoughts of helping him. However, he couldn't bring himself to appreciate it for that reason. He had thought that Mary had made it just for him, for his birthday.

"I guess I got my hopes up too much... I really want to keep this, but I don't want to let Mary down either..."

Seto thought about what to do with the bouquet. It was truly a fine piece of work, and Seto didn't want to let it go that easily.

"Hmm? What's this?"

While he was staring so intently at the branches, he noticed that one of them had a ribbon and a card attached to it. He picked up the card, and read it.

" 'Happy Birthday, Seto. And thank you always'... I think I'll just keep this one branch..."

The next day, at night, Mary asked him a question when he got back.

"Say, Seto. When I was helping to clean the rooms earlier, I noticed a cherry blossom branch in your room. Where did you get it from?"

"Oh, I got it from a friend. A very precious friend mine."

"Is it anyone I know?"

"Yup! It should be quite obvious who it is, too~"

" Hmm... 'previous friend'... 'obvious'..."

Seto smiled while looking at Mary trying to figure out who it was that gave him the cherry blossom branch.

"Thank you, Mary."

"D-Did you say something, Seto?"

"Nope~ It's nothing~"

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**Seto's birthday is exactly one week after 'Spring Arrival Celebration Day' in Japan. I guess that's what made me put cherry blossoms in this fan-fiction.**

**P.S: I love Magni Regni**


End file.
